


it seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye

by saltyvenus



Category: American Horror Story: 1984
Genre: F/F, theyre cute, yes we know montanas a baddie but i won't give up on them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-04
Updated: 2019-10-04
Packaged: 2020-11-23 04:51:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20886419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltyvenus/pseuds/saltyvenus
Summary: i'm always just about to go and spoil a surprise.//three times brooke tells montana she loves her, and the one time montana says it back.





	it seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> brooktana pre-redwood and post-redwood, so most of these tingz are headcanons 🤪

it was strange, the first time. 

“i love you,” brooke had told her, genuine and sincere and raw in the early light of morning, the sheets a mess around their naked bodies, her heart thumping hard in her chest. 

montana’s gorgeous features had frozen for a split second in the amber rays of sunlight, and damn it, but brooke hadn’t the slightest clue what she’d been thinking. 

“no, you don’t,” she'd said eventually, her words careful and concise, something inexplicably sad yet strong apparent in her dark brown irises. 

brooke had frowned, furrowing a brow even as uneasiness rose in her chest. “yes, i do.”

montana had sighed at that, as if she were an exhausted schoolteacher having to explain yet again to a stubborn first-grader that 2 + 2 does indeed equate to 4. “no, brooke, you don’t.” with that, she’d stood from the bed, entirely unashamed in her (glorious) nudity, already pulling on her discarded black lacy panties from the night before and a metallica graphic t-shirt (forgoing the bra entirely) without a single glance spared for brooke, who sat frozen and gawking after her upon the bed, speechless. 

it’d felt like a punch to the gut as she watched her leave: hurtful, unexpected, breath-taking for all the wrong reasons.

and still, she wanted her. badly.

//

she’s drunk the next time she says it. 

it’s “booze night” at xavier’s apartment, him, brooke, chet, ray... montana. 

they’re in one of the living rooms, drinking wine and hard liquor and playing an abundance of stupid drinking games that all seem immature.

they drink and they laugh and they share things—happy things, and things that aren’t so happy; but, it doesn’t matter, because they’re drunk. drunk enough that it doesn’t make much of a difference to talk about the things that made them laugh and cry and scream.

it’s about 3:00am when everyone starts nodding off—ray is snoring loudly into the cushions, chet is cuddled up with a beer bottle on the carpeted floor, xavier is sprawled face-down across the coffee table in what looks to be an overtly uncomfortable position (but he’s drooling lightly onto the wood, muted snores escaping his on every exhale, so for him, it must be working somehow.)

brooke isn’t much better than the rest of them, to be perfectly honest—her eyelids growing heavy, her balance on the barstool wavering, the grip around her glass tumbler weakening with every passing moment. she shouldn’t have drank tonight, but brooke was always too keen to please others. she was only a lightweight.

she doesn’t notice she’s falling until it’s much too late, doesn’t feel the panic in her brain until she’s feet from a head-on collision with the polished ground, doesn’t—

suddenly, there’s warmth surrounding her, strong arms holding her steady, long, bleach blonde hair tickling her nose—montana, she realizes belatedly. of course it’s montana. 

montana takes her to xavier’s bed that night, her movements gentle and soft as she deposits brooke carefully onto the mattress, pulling the sheets up around her in a way that makes her ache for home, for the long-dead mother who used to do just that on every bitterly cold night, a warm smile on her aged features that brooke yearns to see again. 

“i love you, montana.” she murmurs then, her head spinning, her chest burning pleasantly from the alcohol even as she suffers painfully with the magnitude of missing, of wanting her mother back and knowing she can’t have her. it threatens to swallow her whole—the agony, the hurt.

_ but maybe it won’t _ , she thinks, so long as montana is here.  _ maybe i don’t have to be scared anymore. _

montana doesn’t say it back, but she doesn’t freeze this time, either—though, brooke fears that might just be her imagination. or the intoxication. or both. 

either way, she’s certain she’s not imagining things when montana leans in close, when she presses her warm full lips against brooke’s forehead, when she whispers, “sweet dreams, princess,” in that silky-smooth voice of hers and brooke fears she might spontaneously combust with how much she feels for montana in that moment.

montana stays with her for a little while, then—stroking her hair and humming a melody brooke can’t quite place until she falls asleep, sinking easily into soothing ministrations and the warmth of montana’s delicate touch. brooke doesn’t ache for her mother that night. (she doesn’t ache at all.)

she has one last thought before the darkness swallows her whole, before she surrenders to the gentle coaxing of sleep—that she loves montana. more than anything. 

(and this, too: that maybe, just maybe, montana might love her back.)

//

she’s bleeding out the next time it happens, the loud jingle of keys outside and the axe scraping against the cabin walls, the darkness pulling at her in an entirely new way—but it’s much like sleep, to tell the truth. 

it’s colder, and scarier—but more final, somehow. permanent, like it’s not going to leave. (brooke always longed desperately for something like that.)

the burning pain in her stomach is ebbing with every moment she draws near, a strange static-y feeling overtaking her senses until she’s there, at the precipice of blessed rest, at the edge of sleeping forever—she can almost see her mother’s widely grinning face, the softness in it, her presence seeming to reach for her like a blanket of warmth… like peace, at last.

but then, montana is there, dragging her back from that penultimate euphoria, her sweaty face and trembling lips popping into view as brooke’s eyelids flutter, her consciousness oscillating treacherously between reality and somewhere better, somewhere safer.

she wants to flee, wants to let herself fade, wants to surrender—but, montana is there, begging brooke brokenly not to go, kissing the damp skin of her forehead and watching her with glossy red-rimmed eyes, like she’s terrified that if she takes her eyes off brooke for even the briefest of seconds, she might leave. 

(brooke thinks montana might be a little bit psychic.)

brooke takes a long moment to be unsure then, her boldness wavering as the remembrance of her mother pulls at her like an all-powerful magnet, as something unobtrusively rooted well within her very core yearns to answer her call—but, deep down, she’s already made her decision; what’s more, she knows it. 

she feels herself walking away from the only family she’s ever known before she can truly register what’s happening, feels herself returning to the agony that wracks her bleeding torso and the serial killer thumping outside only worsens the unbearable ache in her skull and the sweat-and-dirt-covered face of a blonde-haired angel with mesmerizing brown eyes that calls to her from above like the warmest invitation… like home. 

“i love you, montana.” she chokes out, her words hoarse and quiet—but montana hears her anyways, the woman finally letting tears fall as she bites her lower lip hard, hard enough that brooke worries it might bleed. 

“i love you, too, brooke.” she utters softly as another tear traces her dirty cheek, and the words are like redeeming nectar to brooke’s ears, like the kind of salvation her mother used to tell her about whilst she read brooke the bible every night (though she was never very religious), like the most unadulterated sense of belonging and sustenance and home wrapped in one. 

the thudding outside gets increasingly louder, and her wound throbs, and nothing is okay but somehow it’s more than okay, because brooke loves montana. with everything she has. 

(and montana loves brooke right back.)


End file.
